Our Father, who art in Heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for Thine is the Kingdom, and the Power, and the Glory forever. Amen.

Here are the thoughts I am inspired to think when I pray the Lord's Prayer:

Our Father,

Our Creator and the Source of everything, you are the Divine Parent that responds to us in the same way a good earth parent would, who, recognizing their child crying out in need, responds immediately. You are the ever benevolent parent who does not attempt to control, coerce, or scare us into doing the right thing, but who loves, protects, and guides us, without molly-coddling us, or imposing your Will upon us because You “know our needs better” (even though you REALLY do!) Instead you allow us to learn from the consequences of our choices. Even when we choose to separate from you, you simply wait for our return with open arms.

Who Art in Heaven,

Your Being emanates the highest vibrational frequency possible and invites us to join you in that state of existence that we call ‘Heaven.' To consciously abide in your Presence is to experience Heaven, which is the state of being at one with you, Father. Living in the present moment, in Reality, in your good & merciful company, we experience only Love; in the shadow of your protective wings we are exempt from fear and suffering.

Hallowed be Thy Name,

You are so great that even to call your name, Father, brings instant manifestation. That is why the ancients refused to say your name out loud. Your name, Oh Creator, is unspeakable because you cannot be reduced to mere letters; to attempt to label your Immensity is useless, for to reduce your Limitless Nature cannot be done. You cannot be contained. You are the Manifesting Power of all creation that holds and directs the Life Force and to use your name is sacred, for holy indeed is the Name. “I Am That I Am,” you said when asked what to call you. The vibrational frequency accessed when calling on your name proclaims as real whatever thought or belief follows the universal mantra “I Am _________” and so becomes, in Reality, what is.

Thy Kingdom Come,

We call on you, Most High of the Highest, to rain down upon us the living waters of your vibrational radiance so that we might experience your heavenly Kingdom here on Earth.

Thy Will be done,

For we know and trust that your Will is for our own greater good. You designed us for your own purposes and wait only for our consent to join your Will with our own towards realizing the plan you have held for us since before we were born. We give the totality of our triune nature (mental/emotional/physical) to you for your purposes so that your Will, the Highest Will, can be done through us here and NOW…

On Earth as it is in Heaven.

We seek to be a part of the recreation on earth of Heaven above. Your ancient wisdom-keepers tell us that the life we live on earth is a reflection of our relationship with Source and the heavens above. When we bring our vibrational frequency up the scale, closer to your own, Father, our life situation reflects it. When we live a low vibrational frequency of suffering and pain, then that is what is reflected back to us. The inescapable law in Hermetic Christianity is “As Above so below, as below so Above.” Help us aspire to clear our own vibrational energy field so that we can participate in bringing your Will to Earth.

Give us this day our daily bread,

We are promised bread for only THIS day … because the power of living in the Present Moment where our every need is met is only available to us NOW. “From the exhaustless riches of your limitless supply, we draw all things needed, both spiritual and material.” (B.O.T.A. Pattern on the Trestleboard for Tree of Life, Chesed.) Every need is met, can we believe and accept the gift? Or do we close the door on the manna provided on every level because we don't believe or trust its Source?

Forgive us our debts,

Your forgiveness has already been given … it is just that many of us have yet to accept it; we are waiting until WE decide we've earned it … or suffered enough … or suddenly become worthy of it … Slowly we have come to know that it is only the simple willingness to say yes that determines whether or not we receive your loving kindness – for you are always Here, and ever ready to give it. Your mercy and grace dissolves the bonds that have held us, and we release our mistaken ideas and painful stories from the past. Help us surrender ego pride and accept your fierce and free offering.

As we forgive others.

As we accept your mercy and forgiveness, we naturally become more merciful and forgiving to those who wrong(ed) us. Looking to you as our Source and Guide, instead of living in reaction against an unfair world, we see the gifts that every situation brings and spend less and less time focused on the wrong doings of others. The compassion we are shown by you, Father, leads us to be compassionate with others, and we thank you for your perfect plan in helping us to realize the Kingdom of Heaven here now through this simple act of accepting and giving forgiveness.

Lead us not into temptation,

We know that you are ever vigilant in helping us grow our spiritual connection with you, even if it means to allow us to take dark, dangerous side paths through dark places in our confused thinking, searching we know not what … And sometimes it does indeed appear that those roads must be taken for us to choose again – and perhaps this time it will be you, we choose. We ask your assistance in helping us to resist the temptations of worldly views, of vain seeking after the approval of others, and of seeing the world as a problem that we must fix. Spare us these temptations by helping us see Reality, which is the world as you see it. Grant us that.

But deliver us from evil,

And Father, we ask your protection and deliverance from a life lived in separation from you, for that is the ultimate hell – life spelled backwards, as we pull away from, going against, life and Source. Resistance is the anathema of Heaven on earth. Grant us freedom through consciousness from the limited, painful stories we believe that take us away from your One Reality. God is Love. Through that most powerful of all powers, Love, all darkness is destroyed by the Light of Truth.

For thine is the Kingdom,

You, Father, I Am That I Am, One Source, and Only Reality. You, the Light of Truth, Good Father, Guardian, and Guide, are made of Love and Love is the frequency that establishes the Kingdom of Heaven. Wherever Love is, there is the Kingdom. And you offer it to us. From love, through love, peace is given.

The Power,

You are all the power that ever was or ever will be and you are only available in this moment. Walk with us and prompt us gently when our eyes stray from you.

And the Glory forever.

You are the brilliance even greater than the Sun at it's fullest. Your Radiance is the illumining light that is put before us to guide the way. Yours is the Illumined Mind of the most golden consciousness possible, a brilliance we can not imagine that is the Light of Pure Consciousness.

AMEN.

The beginning and the end are you, Father/Mother Source … you are the never ending spiral of life, and we but tiny embers of your light. Blow on us, Father, your mighty breath of Love, that we might shine even more brightly on our way through this dark night.

These are my thoughts when praying The Lord's Prayer.

Blessings,

(This article is still being refined … just wanted to get it out there, even if it is still a bit rough. 🙂 )

I understand how “pollyannish” forgiveness can appear to some, especially if we think forgiveness means that we must “pretend” or tolerate abuse!

And yet, when we look to the Christ example, we come to see that a big part of what He did was to demonstrate the power of forgiveness in the midst of unthinkable abuse. Jesus IS the ultimate model of what it is to experience total victimization without resorting to victim consciousness. Not once did Christ whine or complain about how unfairly he was being treated. He did not blame, nor attack, nor seek vengeance – although who would blame him if he had? Surely he was justified!

No, Jesus did not waste time in blame or victim resentment. And yet, I certainly don't think of his example of forgiveness (“Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do.”) as being “pollyannish,” do you? He simply followed orders from Above,”I do what my Father tells me.” He walked in peace amidst terrible turmoil, and then told us we could do the same. (“What I have done, you can do as well.”)

And yet, somehow we tend to think this approach only worked for Jesus … that somehow He was the exception. But I have found that forgiveness IS the most powerful solvent for pain. Forgiveness is not to tolerate the intolerable, but to make peace with Reality, so that we can align with the Will of the Father, as Jesus exemplified. One of the ways, Christ “saved” us was by showing us how to live at peace, regardless of what circumstances we face.

How do we do this?

It's simple, but NOT necessarily easy. We come to understand that though we may not control what happens (or happened) to us, we can choose how we see it. And how we see it will determine how we feel about it. We are never victims, regardless of what happens to us, unless we see ourselves as victims.

We apply the Reality Formula™, that says, when we believe what we think, we automatically feel and act as if what we believe is true, and when we feel and act as if it's true, we act in ways that prove us right. In other words, by hanging onto the list of wrongs committed against us, we must believe thoughts that keep us feeling and acting in ways that cause us to suffer.

The word “forgive” comes from the Latin “to forego, ” which means to “let go” of the unhappy story that holds us captive to misery, for instance, to give up the story about what others did to us, to learn what we can from it instead – no, better, to understand that the life we live (and have lived) is the life we were supposed to live to facilitate our growing into the fully mature, spiritual, human being that we came to be. We either see life as a growing opportunity (with all the hard-knocks, and challenges involved) and expand our consciousness through the life difficulties we face, or we walk through life, embittered at the unfair ways we've been treated. It is our choice; one route leads to freedom, the other to bitterness and blame.

For these reasons, (and more) I practice and teach forgiveness. For I believe that it is ultimately cruel to ourselves, NOT to forgive; to do so leaves us burdened with unhappy stories about how we've been hurt, which we regurgitate over and again, to ourselves, if not to others, about what “they did to me.”

Please understand that forgiving has nothing to do with the other person, and it certainly does not mean we force ourselves to endure abusive relationships,or that we must subject ourselves to those who strike out at us out of their own unhappy story.

Forgiveness does mean however, that when we find ourselves in such company, we look for what they are reflecting to us about that part of ourselves that feels wounded, and that may have also been guilty of striking out in justified resentment. (We all have these parts of ourselves – there is nothing we accuse others of that does not also live, at least in potential, within us.) We find and forgive that wounded part of us who is capable of acting just as painfully as those we accuse.

We forgive, ultimately, as I've said before, for us. We love, even as we take care of ourselves, by establishing the space we need, by moving on with our lives when we need to; we forgive because it is the kindest possible thing we can do for ourselves. Forgiveness brings us peace and alignment with our Creator Source.

Help us spread the word!

Like this:

We as humans struggle with the concept of forgiveness. To many of us, to forgive, means to “roll over and take it,” and THAT, we're not having! Nosiree!

So we “make them pay.” We punish them with our resentment, and we gossip to our friends about how they hurt us. Do we feel better now? Really? Oh, I know, there's that fleeting “hurrah” inside, that, “boy, did I show them!” glimpse of revenge -but then we spiral right back into the pit of seething resentment (not a fun place to be!).

Forgiveness is not about letting them off the hook – it's about taking ourselves off the hook!

Forgiveness allows us to give up “judgment duty,” and to let go of our obsession with rehashing in our mind all the ways “they hurt us.” But, who's hurting us now!? We make ourselves suffer to prove them wrong? Surely this is not right! It might even be a working definition of insanity.

Resentment does not resolve hurt … it does not make them change, or to act better; we cannot not make them regret their mistakes. Quite the opposite, we are more likely to see them so distracted by the need to defend themselves from us that they never have to evaluate their own motives or behavior. … Come to think of it, could it be that we are just as caught up as they are in “nursing” our resentments? Have we recognized our part yet?

No, we do not help ourselves, not anyone else, by housing hatred.

As a matter of fact, by doing so we put ourselves in danger of becoming converts. When we nurse grudges we often become that which we hate in them. We become offenders who sound, look, and even end up acting like the very people we resent!

Forgiveness is not something we do for them – we do it as a kindness to ourselves. To forgive means to let go of the story against them that keeps us in misery. We forgive because we don't like to punish ourselves for someone else's confusion.

We forgive because it's the fastest way to peace. Forgiveness sets us free.